appleJAC Users Group

President's Place February 2016

President's Place 

by Joe Mertzlufft

A lot has happened since our last meeting at Immaculate Conception (IC): appleJAC made a donation of our digital projector to IC which they, in turn, have mounted to the ceiling of Kennedy Hall. We have also purchased new wireless microphones to use with the existing IC sound system. I look forward to our setup time being reduced even more, and we should have trouble-free sound that everyone can hear.

 

Since we are in that stormy time of year, I remind you that, if Jefferson City Schools is closed on an appleJAC meeting date, then our meeting will also be canceled.

 

The appleJAC Board has meet a couple times to discuss future meeting topics. With some help from the membership, we have about half of the year now covered with topics. One goal for me this year, as President, is to get more involvement from the membership. We introduced the Video Presentation contest last month, and will have more details at the upcoming meeting. I strongly encourage you to talk to any Board Member if there is something you would like to share with the group. For example, we would be happy to give you 20-30 minutes to show off how you use your Apple device.

 

The Following people won door prizes at the January meeting:
Ron Hansen  - iTunes Card (submit-a-question drawing)

Bill Webb - Box of Chocolates
Sue Snell  - Thumb Drive
Jan Watson  - Purple Stylus
Ros Mouton  - Chrome Stylus
Bonnie Culley  - Screen Protector

Mel Kallal - 5s Case Drive

 

Our upcoming February 2 meeting will feature a Consumer Electronic Show Recap (see agenda below). Tom Piper will first present a slideshow from the sights he saw in Las Vegas. After the Great Break, Tom will demo a number of interesting goodies and gadgets. 

 

As always, there will be time for everyone to ask questions and share your tips and tricks to the group. Please continue to visit our website for more updates and fresh information.

Memories Kept Intact

by Greg Breuer

One of the biggest losses I have seen is the memories we capture on film. These memories, especially those captured on video with handheld camcorders. I successfully moved all those to VHS, but now VHS has gone away. Your only solution is to send your memories away to have some stranger move the analog data to computer files and store them on DVDs.

I have been given hundreds of VHS tapes of movies and am in the process of converting them and storing them. I would like to share my process with you. So far I have converted fifty VHS tapes to MP4 files. I have a high quality VHS player connected to my Mac mini with an Elgato Video Capture adapter and software. The software creates an MP4 video file. I then run the MP4 file through HANDBRAKE, a software which rips DVD videos. I use the Android Tablet preset which almost halves the size of the MP4 file. The file is then stored on an external 2TB hard drive. 

Computers, especially personal computers, used to be used to do personal kinds of stuff. I like to find ways to use this tool for my use. Converting analog to digital has been one of those things for me. I found also that I copy the VHS tape and make the new MP4 file at the same time. I love UNIX! The Mac just plain and simple rocks!